Rewriting Mountain Bike History?

[captaincosmic]

Seem to remember 'off roading' my Raleigh Chopper back in 1976 and that had great knobbly tyres on the back but a washout special on the front. I rode it all round the farm and up and down the disused railway and had fun....didn't feel like a pioneer at the time but hats off to the guys at Raleigh in Nottingham England they were on to something

 

[rumpfy]

I'm pretty sure GrahamJohnWallace is the only one who cares about this at all.

 

[highlandsflyer]

I'm pretty sure GrahamJohnWallace is the only one who cares about this at all.

Shame we don't have a TOTY Award Rumpfy. You would be an s.p.d. shoe in.

 

[Chopper the ex Copper]

I'm not especially bothered, but it is nice that someone is piecing together an accurate history instead of simply adding to the 'Gary Fisher, Joe Breeze and their chums from down the allotment invented the mountain bike' version, which was close to becoming the accepted history, even with pundits who should know better.

And like Apps, some of us were mucking about with our home built tracker bike in the 60's and 70's, and while 700c wasn't around then I'm pretty sure I didn't imagine us spottiebums jealously coveting 27 x 1-1/2 chunky touring tyres for our cow-horned-bar specials, a size actually bigger in diameter that 700c 29ers. For what it's worth I personally invented off road DH riding instead of the early version of trail riding favoured by my fellow yank-beaters. Many a happy day on my Triumph tracker.

I also invented the 69'er, or at least the concept - one day I acquired a puncture and had no means to fix it, so somehow fitted a chopper rear wheel to my Triumph, even going as far as grafting on a Sturmey thumbie. A thing of insane beauty to behold, even if my feet did hit the floor with every pedal stroke...

 

[walleater]

I'm pretty sure GrahamJohnWallace is the only one who cares about this at all.

Meeeeeeoooowwww.......

I've enjoyed reading it. It's pretty obvious that the Repack crew didn't invent mountain biking. People rode bikes off-road since before there were roads! They did invent the name and were the first to properly market it though. It's good to hear some other stories, rather than just Fisher banging on for the last 30 years as a way of marketing his business interests.

 

[walleater]

Oh yeah, I invented North Shore riding in Shropshire circa 1981 riding my Halfords Trackstar over planks of wood suspended between pallets. Granted there was no shore nearby but there was a pond down the road....

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

I'm pretty sure GrahamJohnWallace is the only one who cares about this at all.

Joe Breeze may care about Tom Ritchey's claims to have made a custom built 650b mountain bike in 1977 as this means that Breezer no.1 of 1978 is no longer the first purpose designed and custom built off-road bicycle ever made.

Gary Fisher and Charlie Kelly may care to hear that Tom Ritchey was making mountain bikes long before they asked him to build frames for them. As this implies that the impetus did not come from them.

If Tom Ritchey was building mountain bikes from 1977 onwards? I would say that that is very interesting.
The fact that he made 650b mountain bikes from 1981-83/84 is interesting.
But if he is falsely claiming to have made 650b mountain bikes back in 77 for publicity and marketing reasons? Then that is very boring indeed.

I personally am more interested in grey areas of history than topics that are clear cut. And similarly, I am more interested in the events that happened before I got involved in mountain biking than simply being nostalgic about my own experiences.
I don't post information in order to specifically please or entertain. What people care or don't care about varies greatly, and this is well beyond my ability to preempt. So I simply expect that people won't read what they don't care about.

I also invented the 69'er, or at least the concept - one day I acquired a puncture and had no means to fix it, so somehow fitted a chopper rear wheel to my Triumph, even going as far as grafting on a Sturmey thumbie. A thing of insane beauty to behold, even if my feet did hit the floor with every pedal stroke...

Surely the image this conjurers up alone, is enough to justify this thread.

 

[Ductape]

What about the Finns? Why isn't Graham giving all the credit to the Finns?

They must be heard.

 

[Chopper the ex Copper]

Yes, they invented the concept of paramilitary guerrilla warfare, and the Au Pair.

 

[MADJEZ]

What about the Finns ?

Didn't they sing 'Don't dream it's over'.......

.....I'll get my coat